How you can tell when it’s time for the Congress just to sit down and do nothing. When Democrats and Republicans are making uncharacteristic arguments. Isn’t it strange that Rick Perry, who famously put out a book in praise of federalism, is against federalism on gambling? I’m just going to assume there’s some fluky thing at work here and ignore this aberration from him.

I’ve never been a Robert Gates fan. I’ve always seen him a more of a pale, man-in-a-gray-flannel-suit-type apparatchik. My lack of enthusiasm for Gates and all his works was made more acute when he agreed to stay at Defense as a beard for Barack Obama’s decidedly un-masculine vision of the military. My views shifted a bit when his memoir hit the streets and refreshingly confirmed | Read More »

Yesterday, the West took a small step towards recognizing Russia for what it is: a rogue state that will operate outside international norms to aggrandize power and territory to itself. The G8 officially suspended Russia from membership because of its ravaging of Ukraine and the annexation of Crimea. “International law prohibits the acquisition of part or all of another state’s territory through coercion or force,” | Read More »

The latest episode of the “Consider This!” podcast is out. Conservative commentary in 10 minutes or less. This time, I spent all my time on one topic, but it’s one that spans over 30 years. (But I’ll still be done in 10 minutes or less.) During the presidential debates between Mitt Romney and President Obama, Obama mocked Romney’s thoughts on what was the biggest geopolitical threat. Romney | Read More »

“Vladimir Putin did not read Barack Obama’s soul. He just read Obama’s resume and knew he could take him.” In 1984, Jeane Kirkpatrick, a lifelong Democrat who Ronald Reagan appointed Ambassador to the United Nations, took to the stage at the Republican National Convention in Dallas. The Republicans and this Democrat roundly mocked the unseriousness of the Democrats who wanted to replace Ronald Reagan. Calling | Read More »

Hillary Clinton must be on the missing Malaysian Airlines 777. That seems to be the only plausible explanation that an unbiased press corps has for not asking her how her Russian reset is going. It was Hillary Clinton who presented a physical reset button to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in 2009. To make a big deal about the Obama Administration resetting and rebuilding a | Read More »

DOJ is coming after human trafficking coordinated online. But don’t worry guys, all the drug dealers on Silk Road who get people hooked aren’t to blame at all, except that a lot of the victims of human trafficking get sucked into it via drug addiction. Let alone all the direct human trafficking done via Tor with Bitcoin.

Yesterday, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee passed a bill to authorize loan guarantees for Ukraine, similar to the bill that passed the House last week. The loan guarantee bill doesn’t directly increase spending; rather it adds Ukraine to the list of countries eligible for Economic Support Fund (ESF) grants. ESF grants have already been appropriated and are used as “walking around cash” for the State | Read More »

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently compared actions by Russian President Vladimir Putin in Ukraine to those of Adolf Hitler in 1938 in Czechoslovakia. Although this is hyperbole bordering on veritable absurdity, there are similarities that may explain the roots of the current conflict. In both instances the seeds of despair were planted about twenty years earlier by reckless politicians who drew maps of new countries with flagrant disregard to people’s culture, religion and language. In Germany they were driven by revenge and in the Crimea by expediency.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently compared actions by Russian President Vladimir Putin in Ukraine to those of Adolf Hitler in 1938 in Czechoslovakia. Although this is hyperbole bordering on veritable absurdity, there are similarities that may explain the roots of the current conflict. In both instances the seeds of despair were planted about twenty years earlier by reckless politicians who drew maps of new countries with flagrant disregard to people’s culture, religion and language. In Germany they were driven by revenge and in the Crimea by expediency.

And then they also let fugitive rapist (and co-conspirator with convicted spy Bradley Manning) Julian Assange speak, from his spot in the embassy of Ecuador, a country ruled for years by a leftist President and a regime conducting routine human rights violations. He made no apology for his rape, and promises more propaganda against America.

Sometimes the cronys win, sometimes the cronys lose. They’re reportedly winning on STELA, the bill that scared entrenched, well-connected TV broadcasters because it as going to make them compete for cable dollars in a way that they never have had to in 70s-era winners-and-losers regulations. It’s still likely a good bill, but just not the pro-market bill it could have been.

The good news is the cronys are reportedly losing in Colorado, as entrenched taxi services are feeling the threat from new, innovative competitors. Let the customers decide, not government.

On today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, Brad Jackson and Ben Domenech are joined by Dr. Ariel Cohen to discuss the escalating crisis in Crimea, the economic ties between Europe and Russia that complicate this problem and why this may be a sign that the post-WWII Western power alliance is crumbling.

ACU and other normally small-government types have bafflingly come out against the satellite TV bill STELA, and Steve Scalise’s efforts to enact Retransmission Consent reform, a cable idea first proposed jointly with Jim DeMint. This is wrong, and this is a strange supporting of laws that pick winners and losers.

You see, back in the 70s when Cable TV started to take off, broadcasters and socialists alike freaked out. Broadcasters because they were faced with competition for eyeballs where they previously had a monopoly, and socialists because it offended that someone might actually pay for TV. So they teamed up to rig the system, passing laws and regulations that prevented an open market for many broadcasts, instead creating territorial monopolies for broadcasters. These regulations have let the broadcasters get fat and happy (see also Aereo).

Pass retransmission consent reform. Supporters say without reform we “simulate” a free market, and to reform would harm “content producers.” This turns the truth on its head. Broadcasters are overpaid, underworked middlemen with government-manufactured monopolies. They produce nothing but just happen to hold a government license to spectrum. Make ‘em compete. And certainly never make satellite providers buy from a propagandist like The Weather Channel.